“Prelude” for Solo Clarinet (1987) by Krzystof Penderecki
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Recent Researches in Mechanics, Transportation and Culture “PRELUDE” FOR SOLO CLARINET (1987) BY KRZYSTOF PENDERECKI GOLDBACH FELIX CONSTANTIN VALAHIA University of Targoviste Faculty of Arts and Sciences B-dul Unirii 18 22, 130082, Targoviste, Romania Email [email protected] www.felixgoldbach.ro Abstract: In the domain of chamber music, his creation is just as rich. The stylistic variety denotes as well an evolution of the means used. It comprises pieces for solo instruments, for instance Cadenza and Sarabanda for viola or Capriccio per Siegfried Palm, Per Slava and Divertimento for cello, Prelude for solo clarinet (1987), Capriccio for tuba solo; another category of works is constituted by the chamber music duo, which includes two sonatas, Three miniatures for violin and piano, Three miniatures for clarinet and piano (1956) a trio and four string quartets and also a Quartet for clarinet and strings (1993) and a Sextet (2000). Keywords: chamber music, stylistic variety, music school, symphonic, solo instruments. 1. Introduction the radio and by means of the festivals Warsaw Krzystof Penderecki is one of the personalities of Autumn and Donaueschingen Musiktage. the Polish music, well known and appreciated nowadays. The composer and conductor Krzystof 2. Problem formulation Penderecki was born on November 23, 1933, in The large international recognition is due to his Dębica, a small town near Krakow. He began qualities of explorer, affiliated to the vanguard playing the violin and the piano under his father’s trends of the second half of the 20th century, of guidance. The he studied at the Conservatory of innovator in the domain of musical text, naming of Krakow with Franciszeck Skolyszewski. In 1954, at notes by letters and musical effects, obtained by the Music Academy, in parallel to the study of extending the instrumental means, the composition composition with Stanislaw Wiechowicz and Artur techniques and enjoying popularity. His works are Malawski, he followed the courses of philosophy, present on the radio, in the concert halls, in and history of art and literature. Since 1958, as a festivals, on CDs and in academic curriculums. professor at the music school, he began composing He composed four operas, eight symphonies and and was remarked and received a prize even since diverse symphonic works, of which Uvertura 1959 at the Young Polish Composers Contest from Pittsburg for wind instruments, the Burlesque suite Warsaw, and then the series of prizes continued. for the opera Ubu Rex (for wind instruments In his works one can notice the predilection for the orchestra), while the score of Sinfonietta no. 2 for dodecaphonic, atonal and serial techniques of the clarinet and strings was later on arranged as well for Second Viennese School, especially the influence quartet with clarinet. He also wrote concerts for of Anton Webern, intertwined with the ideas of violin, viola, cello, piano, flute, oboe, horn; for Pierre Boulez and the novelties in the compositions clarinet, he transcribed the flute concert and the of Igor Stravinski. Krzystof Penderecki aroused the viola concert. Among his creations there are interest of certain personalities such as Hermann Moeck and Heinrich Strobel, musical director of the and for Train. He also obtained the Westphalian Prize and the South-West-Radio Foundation’s Experimental Prize of Italia 1967 with Stabat Mater and Passion according Studio, who have made known his prized works1 on to Saint Luc, and in 1968 he was offered this prize again for Dies Irae (dedicated to the memory of the Auschwitz victims), then the Honneger Prize for Symphony no. 4. In 1971 he was 1 First Prize for Strophes, Emanations and Psalms of David in awarded the prize of the Polish Composers’ Union. He was 1959, and in 1969 for the symphonic work Anaklasis. The distinguished with the State Prize First Class of Poland UNESCO Prize 1961 for the Dimensions of Time and Silence (1968). ISBN: 978-960-474-264-6 62 Recent Researches in Mechanics, Transportation and Culture numerous works dedicated to the Catholic cult: In his scores, he introduces multiphonic, harmonic Polish Requiem, Stabat Mother, Passion according orchestrations, slap-tongue effects, special to Saint Luc, Agnus Dei, Psalms of David, cantatas, sonorities described in the Legend of the partition, and the oratorios Dies Irae, Utrenja, Cosmogonia, along with random surfaces, where the interpreter Magnificat. Some of his works were transposed as can build his own version within certain indicated film music. limits, like in the works De natura ssonoris, 3. Problem solution Utrenja and Anaklasis, pieces used as sound tapes His fame recommended him as a professor2, soon for certain movies, due to their particular expressive becoming member of honor3 of numerous cultural qualities. institutions worldwide. His rich activity as a Composed in 1987, the miniature entitled Prelude 6 composer was acknowledged by prizes, medals and for Solo Clarinet is dedicated to Paul Patterson on th international awards4, a cello festival bearing his his 40 anniversary. The piece was published by the name was organized and he became Doctor Honoris Schott’s Söhne Poblishing House, Mainz, in 1988. Causa of many prestigious universities.5 In our opinion, before approaching the piece for In his compositions is present the tendency towards clarinet solo, an interpreter should absolutely listen dodecaphonism, the adhesion to tashism (the music to Lacrimosa no. 10 of the Polish Requiem builds contrasts between sound patches, between composed by Penderecki, carefully following the different densities) and the minimalism of Xenakis’ melodic line of the soprano, as the piece Prelude or John Cage’s works. Influenced by the European has many thinks in common with it, concerning the trend tending to the invention of modal structures, initial and the final atmosphere as well as like O. Messiaen he builds his own scale, made up concerning the dramatism. of semitone and augmented forth (tritone). Later on The work is short, metaphorical and we distinguish he opts for other stylistic variants as well, for the improvisational character that pervades it. The instance Honneger’s expressionism or bruitism. movement is very slow, Lento sostenuto, Preoccupied by renewal, he investigates the interiorized, with a meditative development. particularities of emission of the wind instruments. Prelude develops a bow-like construction, the ends of the bow being areas with an obvious similitude, that we would indicate as +α and –α for their metaphorical significances: it comes from the 2 1966-1968: professor at Folkwang Hochschule of Essen, where he started composing operas. In 1972 he becomes infinite and returns back to the infinite. The idea of Rector of Musikhochschule of Krakow and, between 1973 and this interpretation relies on the fact that the +α 1978, professor at Yale University of New Haven, USA. Since segment reappears in the end, yet the order of the 1972, for 15 years he was the rector of the Academy of initial cells is organized recurrently. Krakow. On the other hand, the two areas, the one of the 3 In 1995, member of honor at Royal Academy of Music of Dublin, in 1998 – of the American Academy of Arts and system 1, with a rarefied beginning and slightly Letters, contributor member of the Academy of Fine Arts of agglomerated towards the end, compared to the area Munich; in 2000 – member of honor of the Gesellschaft der of the final system, system 14, progressively Musikfreunde of Vienna; 2001 – member of honor of the rarefied, have as a common feature the rarity of the Academy of Arts of Hong Kong. melodic-rhythmical units presented, unlike the 4 International awards: Sibelius Golden Medal (1967), EMI prize (1972), Chevalier of Saint George Order, the Great systems 4-12, where the agglomeration of the Cross of Germany (1990), the Austrian Medal for Science and musical figures is very obvious. To this density of Art (1992), the UNESCO prize, the Order of Cultural Merit of the musical discourse contributes the increasing of the State of Monaco (1993), EMI prizes (1995, 1996), Medal the number of short durations per time unit, of the of the Music Academy of the Principality of Asturias, the rhythms in exceptional divisions, and the prize Composer of the year 2000, the Prize of Arts (2001), the Romano Guardini award (2002), 16th Praemium Imperiale intensification obtained using agogic terms, starting 2004 in Tokio. 5 Doctor Honoris Causa of the Music Academy of Gdansk, 6 The English composer and composition and tuba professor University of Washington, Yale, London, Glasgow, Berlin, Paul Patterson (born in 1947), friend of Penderecki, was the Moscow, Rome, Rochester, Bordeaux, Leuwen, Belgrade, leader in charge of the organization of an English festival, Madrid, Poznan, Pittsburg, Leipzig, Sankt Petersburg, Buenos which celebrated a composer’s personality each year, and Aires, Beijing. Member of honor of the town of Bloomington which festival included the participation of the celebrated and of his native town. composer. ISBN: 978-960-474-264-6 63 Recent Researches in Mechanics, Transportation and Culture with system 6, poco a poco accelerando towards consonance and dissonance, two metaphorical the system 9, noted with più mosso. ideas, with a large sphere of significances. The deceleration occurs using both of these parameters, namely the progressively augmented durations and agogically, through the indication poco a poco al tempo 1. We discovered in this way Example: the main motive, system 1, times 9-10 and a second arc, which is rhythmical, and a third, 11-13 which is agogic. We will exemplify our statements through the rarefying of +α and –α. In the initial exposition, the sounds appear much more distanced by breath marks, the aerated cells can be understood as significance and the waiting for a new sonorous event generates tension. The cells of information unite in increasingly larger structures, created out of three or more elements with a random inner order.